Dhamma Talks - Patience :: Buddhapadipa Thai Temple

Patience is the most important virtue that people nowadays must practice. Because people now seem to lack patience, so a lot of violence happens. Without patience, things small or big can go wrong; they all give rise to the fight against each other, harming each other, making war and killing each other, and so on. Impatience seems to be the cause of these miserable events.

Impatience supports all desire; greed, hatred and delusion. It cannot stand anything from small to big. It gives rise only to disadvantages. This can be observed in the Buddha’s teachings* when the Buddha said to his disciples, “Behold monks, impatience gives rise only to disadvantages as follows; hatred, lots of problems and revenge, carelessness and suffering. Having known this, you all should learn to be patient; thinking, hearing and seeing things as they really are, don’t form any opinion about them, don’t feed them or react to them in terms of supporting them to grow. Monks, when you are patient, then you are calm, loved by others, no revenge is taken upon you, you are far away from problems, mindful and happy. These are the advantages of patience”.

It always sounds nice to hear the advantages and disadvantages as we can compare them to see what is profitable or unprofitable in our life. And then, we can keep away from the actions which cause non-profit in our life, and practise the action which brings about benefit to our life. To see the good and bad sides is great, in terms of comparison, to see things clearly. It is comparable to a coin which has two sides as is said, “Don’t judge the coin that is ugly when you see only one side, turn it up on the other side, it may be impressive in its beauty”. Patience is a good side of life which we must cultivate in life and develop, as it brings about only benefits, as the Buddha said above.

*Pancaka Nipata Anguttara Nikaya